‘Oh. Well, aren’t you even a little bi-curious?’
‘I have to go.’
‘Wait. Cut through the woods with me. We’ll share a quick joint, you know, as friends. Unless you’re in a rush to get home.’
Regina heads for the woods, Lilith in tow.
Longboat Key, Florida
Immanuel Gabriel is alone in the SOSUS lab when his Aunt Evelyn knocks on the open door. ‘Mind if I join you?’
The dark-haired twin doesn’t bother looking up. ‘Jake’s not here.’
‘Actually, I wanted to speak with you.’
‘What for?’
She approaches, using a cane to support her arthritic left hip. ‘What are you working on?’
‘I’m charting a new whale migration pattern.’
‘May I listen?’
Immanuel plugs in a set of headphones, then passes them to the old woman.
‘There’s so many of them. Such godly creatures.’
‘I’m not like him, you know.’
‘I know.’
‘He drives me crazy.’
‘Your brother can be… intense.’
‘He’s a nut job. Why do you humor him?’
‘Maybe I’m a nut job, too.’
Immanuel smiles. ‘Hey, wanna see something cool?’ Evelyn waits patiently as the teenager pulls up an image on screen of a four-legged oversize ratlike animal. ‘See this creature? It’s called a Pakicetid. It’s actually a prehistoric whale.’
‘That’s a whale?’
‘Well, it was the ancestor of whales. For some unknown reason, Pakicetids returned to live in the sea about 50 million years ago. They eventually lost their fur, which was replaced with thick layers of insulated blubber. Nature even repositioned their nostrils on top of their heads so they could breathe easier.’
Evelyn smiles at the teenager. ‘You really have a deep love for whales, don’t you?’
‘I suppose.’ He advances the page. ‘Look here. This is Rodhocetus , the first species of whale with a true fluke and blowhole.’
‘That is amazing. Whales have really come a long way, haven’t they?’
‘Uh-huh.’ Immanuel continues the program. ‘Modern cetaceans eventually split into two different suborders. Baleen whales, like blues and humpbacks, have no teeth. Toothed whales, like sperm whales and orcas, remained predators, developing a sense called echolocation.’
‘Echolocation? Is that those high-pitched clicking sounds?’
‘Exactly. My grandma says the clicks allow toothed whales to see things using sound. By listening to the returning echoes, the mammals can navigate through their environment, seeing things we could never register with our own eyes.’
‘Sort of like a built-in sonar, huh?’
‘That’s right. Echolocation gives whales x-ray vision. Grandma says a dolphin or whale can detect a shark swimming hundreds of meters away, using its echolocation to see right into its belly to determine if it’s fed recently.’
‘Does your grandmother know why there are so many whales migrating into the Gulf of Mexico?’
‘It’s the anomaly.’
‘Anomaly? What anomaly?’
‘The one she detected in the Chicxulub Crater. It’s screwing up the whales’ sense of direction.’
‘I don’t understand?’
‘Inside a whale’s brain are these things called magnetite crystals. Whales navigate by tuning in to the Earth’s magnetic force fields. It’s sort of like having a built-in compass. The magnetic anomaly in the Gulf is scrambling their compasses, confusing them. That’s why a lot of them are beaching. My grandpa Julius, he knew all about whales, too.’
‘How do you know that?’
‘It’s in his journal.’ The teen types in another command, causing a new home page to appear on screen.
THE JOURNAL OF JULIUS GABRIEL
Your grandfather’s memoirs?’
‘Uh-huh. Jake transferred everything to audio disk. Computer, recite Journal Entry 722.’
JOURNAL E NTRY #722
RECORDED ON THE N AZCA P LATEAU, N AZCA, P ERU.
JANUARY 17, 1993.
The computerized voice of the late Julius Gabriel crackles from behind the surround-sound speakers:
Of all the zoomorphs engraved in the desert pampa, perhaps the most bizarre are those of the three Nazca whales, each mammal drawn distinctly different from the next.
I shall begin with the oldest of the lot, a thirty-foot specimen possessing an enormous fluke and four leglike appendages. Although several of my colleagues regard the addition of these strange appendages as ‘artistic license,’ I disagree, believing our ancient artist had something different in mind.
Paleontologists have determined that modern whales descended from an extinct giant rodentlike land mammal called a Pakicetid. This terrestrial creature mysteriously walked back into the sea on all fours sometime after the asteroid strike that led to the extinction of the dinosaurs. In the 25 million years that followed, evolution succeeded in transforming this land mammal into an ocean dweller.
Equally mystifying is a strange object that was drawn below the ancient cetacean’s lower jaw. Most of my peers have identified this feature as the mammal’s spout. Here I disagree emphatically. Anatomically speaking, a whale’s blowhole is part of its dorsal surface, yet this object has clearly been drawn below the creature’s lower jaw. My colleagues’ rebuttal to these inarguable facts is simply to shrug the matter off, crediting it to a mistake made by the artist.
Mistake? The ancient Nazca icons and geometric figures are inhumanly precise. Was the creator of these drawings capable of such a grievous error? I think not.
My theory, improbable as it sounds, is that the circular object was meant to represent a form of communication. I believe the creator of the Nazca drawings was able to communicate with these ancient whales, and the artist clearly wanted us to know it.
‘Computer, end program.’ Immanuel looks up at the old woman. ‘Well?’
‘Well what?’
‘Do you think the Guardian communicated with whales?’
‘Honestly, I have no idea.’
‘Jake thinks they did. Last night he was out on the beach and… ah, never mind. It’s stupid.’
‘What’s stupid?’
‘Nothing. I have to go.’
‘Wait, Manny, before you leave, I wanted to ask you a question.’
‘Just one?’
‘Are you happy?’
‘Are you?’
‘I try to be.’
Immanuel looks away. ‘I hate it here. It’s like being in prison. Mom’s paranoid-she never lets me leave, and Jake is a jerk, always acting like some goddam drill seargent. All he cares about is his stupid fantasies.’
‘It must be hard on you.’
‘It’s harder on her. He treats our mother like crap.’
